Darla entered the Blues Bar for once not looking for a meal or trouble. Just some fun. She'd already eaten earlier, and thanks to her meal had the bus ticket for the first leg of her trip south to Sunnydale in her purse.

~*~

Amanda looked up to catch the waitress' eye and instead caught sight of the young woman entering the bar and gasped.

"Amanda?" Duncan asked concerned.

"Nothing...just saw someone who looked like a girl I knew before I even met you."

Duncan nodded and turned his attention back to his 'debate' with Methos.

Amanda lost track of the conversation beside her and forgot about her empty glass as she remembered the little girl from--nearly 500 years ago now.

Filthy little street urchin who'd tried to pick Amanda's pocket. She didn't have a father. Her mother she sort of remembered but had died "a long time ago" according to the child no more than six or seven at the time.

She didn't have a name...her mother had called her darling girl, but she didnt' remember a name. The intelligence in those young eyes had gotten to Amanda.

"Darling girl" had been taken to Amanda's home washed, bathed dressed, renamed Darla and then sent on to a convent. With Amanda's generous sponsor ship Darla would be given an enducation, at the time Amanda had hoped the girl would eventually become an Abbess, she had the intelligence to manage the estate that went with most convents.

Darla had lasted less than a year at the convent. Ran away. Amanda had tracked her down again. The girl had declared she had no use for a god that had no use for her and wasn't going back.

So Amanda taught her everything she knew herself. Taught her things Duncan would likely throw a fit over.

~*~

Darla felt eyes on her, she nearly called out to the woman sitting at the back table. It couldn't be Amanda though. Amanda had died 460 years ago.

Amanda had found her on the streets, caught her picking her pocket. Tried to make Darla a lady by sending her to the sisters who proclaimed her evil and worthless and tained street orphan that she was.

Amanda had found her a second time when Darla had ran from the convent. Her benefactress had declared if she wasn't going to be a lady, she was going to be a woman of means and independence any damned way she could be. Amanda had taught her how to fight, how to steal, how to read and write and manners good enough to dine with royalty. She taught Darla how to catch a rich man to keep her and get jewels, gold and other gifts from him, and to stock pile it for when he tired of her.

By the time Darla lay dying and the Master had come for her, she had been a rich woman. Had been the mistress of a Duke, and left him with enough money to establish her own "House" one that catered to the aristocracy. Some might condemn Amanda for the path she set Darla on, but without Amanda, 'darling girl' would have been a dockside whore by the age of twelve and dead before eighteen like most other street girls like she had been.

Her mentor and benefactress was the one thing Darla still missed of her human life. She pushed the melancholy thoughts from her head and turned her attention on the man offering to buy her a drink. He looked like he could prove a diversion until she had to leave, and begin the journey to her Sire, who would soon rise from his prison now that all the portents were aligned properly.